Sylvia initiation story

1. Initiation --Sylvia Plath
Presented by: Claire Gui

2. About the author
 1932 – 1963 (30 years old)
 Born in Boston
 Suicide because of depressing
 poet, novelist, short-story writer
 studied at the University of Cambridge
 best known
TheColossus &Poems andAriel

3. About the story
 A girl called Millicent in high school gets invited into
a sorority club.
 She has to go through an initiation to get into the
club.
 First, she feels very pround that she can join the club.
But later she finds that is very tired so she does not
want to be a member.
 At the end of the initiation she decides she doesn't
want to join the club.

4. When and where is the story set?
 Time: mid-early fall, at the beginning of the school
year.
 Place: a high school called Lansing high school

5. The characters
 Millicent - Protagonist
Blonde hair, short, skinny, and pretty
 Tracy
Static "Preppy" personality
 Beverly - Antagonist
Mean and aggressive
 Herb
Cute boy in his teens Kind personality
 Louise
Very nice Character
Millicent is trying to figure out where she is.

6. What is the main conflict of the story?
 Internal conflict was in Millicent. She was struggling to
find her identity. Should she stay friends with Tracey and
be free like a heather bird? Or, should she join the
sorority and be trapped like the birds that all look alike?
 The External conflict was between Millicent and all of the
other sorority girls. They had her doing embarrassing
things for the hazing ceremony called "rat court." The
cracked eggs on herface, trapped herin a basement, and
made herdo the Charleston Step to school.

7. What are the develpments?
 Millicent goes through the "rat court" hazing ceremony.
She likes a boy, but the rules of rat court say she can't
even talk to him. This is when she started to dislike her
decision to join this sorority. She realizes that she'd rather
not be with the sorority, and would rather be free.
Millicent tells Tracey about it, but later found out the she
had been rejected because of some stupid rules She goes
into the basement forone last time before the initiation is
over .Millicent saw birds outside the window which
reminded her of the sorority girls. They were like the
birds she saw since they all looked and acted the same.

8. What is the main message of the story?
 conformity and having friends is a wonderful idea
 the idea of having an individual identity and being
an individual is stronger
 being an individual offers more opportunities to
become a unique person